Irritable bowel, irritable you and me

Perhaps I should only speak for myself, about the irritable part, I mean. There are very few discomforts in life which are more painful, consistently aggravating and mess with your social life as much as irritable bowel syndrome. For many of us, it has changed our eating habits, infringed on our good natures and forced us to know where every bathroom is located within a five-mile radius – stores, restaurants, rest stops, we got it covered if you ever want to know.

When I was in nursing school, one of the instructors referred to the gastrointestinal system as “the tube within the tube.” I don’t know why that stuck with me all these years. I guess I’d never been called a tube before. So, how’s your tube? Mine is much better these last few years but for most of my adult life I have suffered from chronic constipation or diarrhea, abdominal pain, heartburn and general dyspepsia. What a great old-fashioned word that is to say you have problems with your “tube.”

I have “gone the route,” with the X-rays, the barium swallows, the CT scans, the ultrasounds, the lab work, etc. The results for me were always inconclusive except for some diverticulum in the gut, which is fairly common, especially as one gets older.

More simply put, there are little annoying pouches in the gut which can trap non-soluble fiber. These pouches trap and hold certain indigestible food particles such as corn fiber and seeds, causing the bowel to become overactive in an attempt to expel its contents or “cough it up” so to speak. If these pouches become inflamed, you have diverticulitis, which can be very painful and in extreme cases require surgical intervention.

In my life and body, the problem has usually been diagnosed as irritable bowel syndrome. Not to be confused with the more life-threatening Crohn’s disease or Irritable Bowel Disease. Don’t misunderstand me, IBS all by itself can certainly ruin your day. Until I read everything I could get my hands on and started a great many modalities on my own, it was not at all uncommon to double over with pain, be totally unable to have a bowel movement and a couple of times, faint while sitting on the toilet. The “john” is certainly no fainting couch and I am somewhat embarrassed to admit it to you but, in the interest of knowledge…

Many of us with a form of autoimmune disease have lousy mucosal lining, starting at the mouth and going all the way through to the exit. Some of us also have Sjogren’s Syndrome, with its accompanying dryness of eyes, nose and mouth. (That we’ll save for another blog.) Sometimes the mucosa is reacting to non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), which most of us know can play havoc with the lining of the gut. Many pain meds can slow down the peristalsis in the gut. It helps to think of the little conveyor belt which constantly moves food and fluid along in the gut as “the wave.” It’s either that or the analogy of the last nature film you saw where a large boa constrictor swallowed another animal and you saw the ripples. See? “Wave” sounds better. The list of drugs which attacks the lining of the gut is long which is why we should each be informed as to what we take and its possible side effects.

Antibiotics can cause increased peristalsis because they kill off all the good bacteria in the “tube” causing the “wave” to get overly active. Many of us found that replacing the bacteria with good bacteria, found in acidophilus, i.e. yogurt with active cultures and buttermilk, or taking the acidophilus liquid or gel caps, helped the “wave” to calm down. For others, lactose intolerance enters the picture and can annoy the “wave” something fierce. I think we should talk about all of these things, don’t you? Next week, I will share with you what has worked for me and made my life more tolerable, at least when it comes to “the tube” and “the wave.”

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Sue Falkner-Wood

Sue Falkner-Wood is a retired registered nurse living in Astoria, Ore., with her husband, who is also an R.N. Sue left nursing in 1990 due to chronic pain and other symptoms related to what was eventually...read more